Photo: AP

No time to ease into things, Byron Scott. Your second day as coach of the Cleveland Cavaliers may prove to be your most important.

At tomorrow's meeting with LeBron James, owner Dan Gilbert, general manager Chris Grant, and Scott will look to convince LeBron James that their team should be the winner in the LeBron sweepstakes. They'll do this by preaching the familiar, home-based, defensive winning culture that they have established together with James over the past seven years, combined with the new strategy and experience with Byron Scott and the ability to make the roster better in this offseason as well as beyond. The Cavaliers' hope is that they will be rewarded for attempting to win at all costs for the past several years rather than others who have embraced losing for the chance to entertain LBJ this week.

The Cavalier front office believes that Scott is the man for the job because of his championship pedigree as a player, his proven track record of his overachieving and going deep into the playoffs, and his defensive philosophy and stronger offensive presence. Scott played for the old school Pat Riley in Los Angeles, and he believes in a consistent, tenacious defense that will get the Cavaliers through games where the offense isn't working as well. In short, "defense wins championships". Does that sound familiar? It should, because that's been the bedrock of this franchise and a lot of what Mike Brown hammered into his players in five largely successful years as Cavs' head man.

The difference? Scott runs a Princeton style offense that stresses ball and player movement while being opportunistic in transition. "We'll still run portions of the Princeton offense, but the emphasis on the offensive end will be to really try to get up and down the floor," said Scott. Whatever he runs, it should be an improvement on Mike Brown's system, which can be best remembered as the "LeBron James 1-on-5 show" that often stalled, especially with James out of the game. Now, players like LeBron, Mo Williams, Daniel Gibson, Anderson Varejao, J.J. Hickson, and Jamario Moon can utilize their strengths by running the floor for easy baskets. Scott's most important and perhaps daunting task if LeBron returns will be to get LeBron to stick to the offense, to believe in it, and to do less improv when it comes to that end of the floor. For years, analysts, such as Charles Barkley, have screamed for the Cavaliers to play more fast-paced. With or without LeBron, it appears the wine and gold are headed that way.

Byron Scott's weaknesses are said to be a stubbornness and lack of in-game adjustments along with the player mutinies in New Jersey and New Orleans after a couple years of success. Addressing his previous mistakes, Scott was open about his faults when starting out in New Jersey. He said, ""I thought I learned from those mistakes, as far as being able to get along with players a little better and still be me." Perhaps, he did learn, because Chris Paul was one of his biggest fans and clearly upset about his firing. Paul has reportedly given positive reviews to LeBron about Scott. We'll see if LBJ takes CP3's word for it.

Watching the press conference, I admired Scott's ability to communicate in a cool, calm, confident tone. He addressed every single question regarding LeBron from the stance that LeBron would return, but reiterated that he was excited about the opportunity to join this winning franchise regardless. He stated that there is indeed no out clause to take the Lakers job if it opens a year from now, and he seemed genuinely enthusiastic about hitting the ground running. He has hired his former lead assistant from New Orleans, Paul Pressey, a three-time All-NBA defensive team member, for the same job here in Cleveland.

I was particularly impressed with Scott's answer to the question about the Cavaliers' early playoff exit. Byron conveyed that Boston was an experienced, healthy, hot team, and that "sometimes you run into a hot team at that time, that could be their downfall". Additionally, he described the Cavs as having "taken their lumps", likening them to the Bulls and the Pistons of his era. "You've got to take your lumps sometimes, and I think this team is right there, right now, in that position where they can get over the hump." Essentially, he summed up how I've felt about this team for the last three years.

Chris Grant also took some questions, and I liked his answers to some tough questions as well. When asked about their strategy, he gave a confident, honest reply, "the one thing that we have in place here is we have a good team, we have an established good team, this team is knocking on the door." This team is close with LeBron, and the Cavs now they have the pieces to pull off a big trade if LeBron gives them his signature. "Dan's ability to provide us with, whether it's trades, buying draft picks, putting money in trades, we've established some good things here." In short, Dan Gilbert is one of the biggest recruitment chips that the Cavaliers have. In his five years in charge, Gilbert has given this organization a much-needed facelift and brought it up to the likes of the Bostons, Los Angeleses, and San Antonios of the league. "You go around the league.. people say how do the Cavs do it? We're proud of that," said the GM. That's one of the biggest demons the Cavaliers are battling right now, the entire league and nation against them, openly doubting that James will want to stay in Ohio any longer.

When asked about what he's going to tell James, the Cavaliers' new head coach said he will tell LeBron, "this is the right time, I think I'm the right coach." The wine and gold hope that Scott can convince James that winning a title in his hometown is the greatest accomplishment he can achieve. After all, Scott would know. The Inglewood, CA native won three titles with the Showtime Lakers in the 1980s. With these new exciting ideas, the Cavaliers hope Scott will outshine the other head coaches that covet LeBron with Thibodeau (Bulls), D'Antoni (Knicks), Johnson (Nets), Spoelstra (Heat), and the vacancy with the Clippers.

At least, that's what the Cavaliers are banking on.

All for one. One for all. Please stay, LBJ!

Kirk

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